what made me laugh all weekend

Me: I just remember the feeling of UTTER JOY when you'd open a present you really, really wanted when you were a kid.
Mark: Yeah, totally.
Me: Like when I'd open a new Cabbage Patch Kid, I would almost start crying.
Mark: That's nothing. When I was eight my parents gave me the Star Wars Dagobah playset and I was so excited that I passed out.

high school playlist

I love all those random people that make all those random mixes on iTunes. I was always the mix tape maker of my friends in high school and college, so it's nice to see others with the same compulsion. Plus all those 90s mixes make it so easy to go from living in the present moment to being so completely wrapped up in nostalgia that you sit there clicking around, listening to different song clips, and when your phone rings you yell into it, "Oh my GOD do you remember PM Dawn?"

So anyway, here's my high school playlist. I only have a few freshman and sophomore year songs, and then move right into junior and senior year songs, because they were much more musically memorable (say that five times fast). Anyway, this will soon be followed by my college playlist...and hopefully in a couple years, a 20s playlist. No small feat.

Birdhouse in Your Soul - They Might Be Giants
Possibly the most important song of my high school years, because it introduced me to TMBG and also to life beyond Top 40 radio. I remember the exact moment that I heard it, sitting on the floor with my friends in Alison's living room, knowing my life had changed. I think I was 14.

Spending My Time - Roxette
Roxette's Joyride and TMBG's Apollo 18 were the first CDs I ever bought. This song was my anthem for my crush on Peter, whom I adored freshman year summer. And still do, but in a different way.

Damn I Wish I Was Your Lover - Sophie B. Hawkins
I remember my dad picked the cassette single off the floor and that title really got a reaction out of him, and I was all, "Dad, jeez, what's the problem?" I think he knew then that there was nothing left to do but hope for the best.

Silent All These Years - Tori Amos
Ahh, Tori. I knew every breath on her first several albums and adored her. This song kicked it off.

Freak Me - Silk
Ha ha. HA HA HA. Even when I was 14 I knew this was a horrendous sex song. It was in the same place on the charts for several weeks and so they played it at around the same time every night on the radio and it was when I'd be taking a shower, and I remember blasting it and singing along as I washed my hair. (My poor parents.) Plus I read an interview with Joey Lawrence in Sassy where he said that it was his favorite song and I thought that was really funny. (By the way, if you also read Sassy and remember Margie, you should read this.)

November Rain - Guns 'N Roses
Right?!? The video! Oooh, what HAPPENED? I always felt like Axl loved her SO MUCH that he just squeezed the life right out of her. Plus that girl knocked that other girl off the bar stool with one hand and that was cool.

Smells like Teen Spirit - Nirvana
Naturally. This was a milestone song for anyone who went to high school in the early 90s, regardless of whether you were really into them or not. Recently I was watching something on VH1 where all the 80s metal guys were talking about how thrown off they were when the world started transitioning to the grunge phase, and I was thinking about how big and important it felt at the time, certainly not like just the latest phase. I think it was the perfect time to go to high school; I missed the hair bands and made it out just before boy bands made their comeback.

Jeremy - Pearl Jam
Which song to pick? I went with this one mostly because it was my first introduction to Pearl Jam and also the one with the deeply memorable video, not because of the ending but because of all of Eddie's faces. Oh God, I loved Eddie Vedder so much and STILL DO. I can't even talk about it, I'm getting dizzy.

Round Here - Counting Crows
Good camp memories.

Cryin' - Aerosmith
Oh, man...like everyone else, I loved it for the video. I probably watched it 100 times. I loved, loved Alicia Silverstone and her clothes and her attitude and her hair and everything.

No Rain - Blind Melon
I never completely loved this song, but I have such a happy association with it, from around the beginning of my junior year. I can't even put my finger on it, but it was just good stuff.

Big Empty - Stone Temple Pilots
This was a driving around with friends song, back when driving anywhere was awesome just because you could.

Hunger Strike - Temple of the Dog
More Eddie goodness. OHMYGOD, I'm listening to it right now and I can't even deal, he is the sexiest man on the PLANET, I don't care how much saying that dates me.

Leaving Las Vegas - Sheryl Crow
I'm not sure why I liked this one so much, but I just remember loving it. I also remember that if I started playing it when I left my house, the line "take this loser hand and make it win" was on by the time I pulled into Justin's driveway.

Big Star - Letters to Cleo
Loved them, loved this song, total senior year stuff.

Gepetto - Belly
See above.

Add it Up - Violent Femmes
Justin made a mix tape for me around the time that we were going from being best friends to being in love but not yet telling each other how we felt, so the tape was so charged up it was ridiculous. Anyway, this was the first song on it. (In retrospect, could his feelings, however dysfunctional, have been any clearer?) It was also the song Ethan Hawke sang to Winona Ryder in Reality Bites when he was all mad and jealous that she was dating Ben Stiller. ("Have I stepped over some line in the sands of coolness with you?")

Good - Better than Ezra
Just that nostalgic-emotional-graduation feeling of thinking you're totally separating from most of the people that you've been so close with for so long. And you are. Thankfully when you're 17 you're scared but also convinced there are bigger and better things out there for you. And there are.

Violet - Hole
Ha ha ha. I was trying to figure out which song from Live Through This needed to be on this list; I loved that album. I was tempted to put on I Think That I Would Die, for the title alone.

Terrible Lie - Nine Inch Nails
Oh Trent, with a name like that you should've been playing lacrosse. And getting to third base with Kelsey.

Hand in my Pocket - Alanis Morissette
I realized during my senior year summer that Alanis made good eating disorder music. For whatever reason I remember especially liking the lines "I'm sick but I'm pretty" and "I'm tired but I'm working," like I was spending eleven hours a day crunching numbers and supporting a family of six or something, and not putting in 25 leisurely hours a week at a bookstore in a strip mall. (The tired part probably resonated with me because I was only eating that sugar-free Jell-O at the time.)

Master and Servant - Depeche Mode
I remember Peter made me a Depeche Mode mix and I was like, WHAT IS THIS?

Stay - Lisa Loeb
This one was also from Reality Bites, which was clearly a big movie for me around this time. "Vicky just figured something out, something wonderful...Evian is naive spelled backwards!" Yeah, I can still quote the thing to death. And it forever impacted how my peoples and I dance to My Sharona. Anyway, I just thought this song was so great and meaningful, and I loved the stream-of-consciousness of it because it was how I was trying to write at the time, "I have so much to say that I...and this other thing, and I don't know, you just...", like emotional ADD.

Punk Rock Girl - Dead Milkmen
I loved this song! "We went to a shopping mall and laughed at all the shoppers." I remember playing it over and over and over on Justin's and my radio show at the school station on Thursday nights, 7-9. It was the perfect time slot except for the fact that I missed My So-Called Life.

Live Forever - Oasis
Another sentimental favorite. I almost put "Maybe you're the same as me, we see things they'll never see, you and I are gonna live forever" in my senior quote, but instead I quoted St. Elmo's Fire: "Nothing mattered but the moment we were in." Cheeeeese, but at least it wasn't Silk.

There may be a jillion that I forgot. What are some of yours?

no mas tequila, por favor...OK, uno mas

I could say a lot of things about Mexico, but a picture is worth a thousand words. Have you ever stayed in a hotel room with an in-room liquor dispenser? If not, you must be an upstanding member of society. The funny thing is that it was one of the things I was most excited about for this trip and, of course, we didn't use it once. The drinks were free everywhere, and we couldn't rationalize doing a shot out of a water glass in our hotel room. (We also had a fridge full of Corona and instead drank all the bottled water to stay hydrated. Ha, we're senior citizens.)

But getting back to the in-room liquor dispenser (that's how I started most of my sentences over the past few days). How freakin' great is it? I'll be honest, I was a tiny bit disappointed because I was expecting this spout emerging from the wall producing vast quanities of anonymous grain alcohol, and I was going to fill random things in our hotel room with the booze just to teach them a lesson about making it too easy in the spring break capital of the world. It was comforting to know that they were at least pushing the old familiar Jose, but what's up with Home Run rum, or whatever the hell that stuff is? That's not okay!

Anyway, we had a great time. What else can I say? You know how it goes in Mexico.

reheated groomsman

The Bride is back from her honeymoon and wants to fix me up with the Best Man. She didn't tell either of us this before the wedding, and at the blessed event he actually picked up Jen. (Shocker, I know.) While Bride was away for two weeks eating grapes or whatever she was doing, Jen and Best Man went on an uneventful first and last date. Nice guy, no connection, no big deal. But it does sort of make me not want to date the guy myself, as you can imagine. However, this, I was not expecting:

Me: I'm not sure I can date Jen's leftovers.
Bride: Well, I MARRIED your leftovers.

Whoa.

Me: Umm...
Bride: Well, I DID.
Me: Well, I mean...I never really DATED Groom.
Bride: No, because you wouldn't even agree to go out with him ONCE.
Me: Well...
Bride: You hated him as soon as he opened his mouth.

She's laughing, unfazed, apparently finding this hilarious. I should point out that this is the FIRST time she's had a sense of humor about this stuff. For a year and a half now it's been more like, "You were the catalyst for our love!" and hokey shit like that.

Bride: Yeah, I was telling someone that lame line that he gave you, remember how he said...
Me: Yeah yeah I remember.
Bride: ...and how you called me and you were like, "Listen to what this total loser said to me!"
Me: I definitely would have chosen my words more carefully if I'd known you were going to marry him.
Bride: It's okay. I tease him about it all the time.

All the time? Suddenly Groom's inexplicable loathing of me doesn't seem so inexplicable.

Bride: So anyway, Groom was the one who brought it up. He said, "What do you think about Red and Best Man?"
Me: Oh.
Bride: We talked about it a lot, actually! See, he's sort of shy but YOU could bring him out of his shell.
Me: Uh-huh.
Bride: Plus his family lives far away so you guys could spend the holidays with your family!
Me: Holidays?
Bride: We figured it all out! We even gave you kids.

This is maybe a good time to mention that I don't really want to be fixed up with anyone, particularly not someone with whom I already have imaginary children.

Also? The new sunscreen doesn't work. What's that about?

outlaw

I'm back from a great weekend on the Cape with the family, Melissa, Joe, Kelsey, and Trent. I'm working this week to pay for mi vacacion that I'm leaving for on Friday. And today, this:

Mark: Hey.
Me: Well, I got your freakin' sheet music.
Mark: What happened?
Me: I got pulled over by the Ritzington police for making an illegal U-turn.
Mark: Really?
Me: I'm next to the field where the American Revolution started and I got pulled over for making a U-turn.
Mark: That sucks.
Me: Not just that. It turns out my registration is expired. I JUST sent my check to the registry but it's late. I swear I've NEVER been late with that before. So this cop tells me I can't drive my car.
Mark: No way.
Me: Yeah. He tells me, "Well, technically I should have you towed, but you can leave it behind that church over there and get someone to come get you."
Mark: So where are you now?
Me: Behind the church!
Mark: I'm sure he left already. Just go.
Me: You think?
Mark: Yes.
Me: What if he's waiting for me?
Mark: He's not. Just inch out.
Me: What if he sees me trying to leave?
Mark: You're not a fucking prisoner. Tell him you were confused.
Me: Confused about what "don't drive your car" means?
Mark: I'm sure he's gone. Are you checking?
Me: Yes, I'm inching out. This is a strange situation.
Mark: Do you see him?
Me: No, but it was an unmarked car. He could be anywhere!
Mark: I'm sure he's not waiting for you.
Me: You don't know about policemen in small towns. Okay, I don't see him.
Mark: Okay, then go.
Me: I'm going.
Mark: You're fine.
Me: Now I'm on the run from the law.
Mark: You're a felon. I shouldn't even be talking to you.
Me: You're involved in this too, Thelma. I never would've been in Ritzington if I wasn't picking up your sheet music.
Mark: I don't know anything about that. Who is this?
Me: I'm a dangerous criminal.
Mark: I'm hanging up.

first base

Do you remember when your social life was basically all about finding a place to make out?

Before you go jumping to conclusions, I should say that I didn't have sex in high school (which will allow me to be appropriately outraged when I find out my kids are). And it wasn't like I dated a ton. I'm not sure who did, actually. In high school it seemed like you either had a boyfriend or a girlfriend or a crush and that was it. You didn't just have a random dinner date with the guy across the row in math class. Nobody was thinking, "Well sure, she's nice, but I kind of want to keep my options open." There was a great, dramatic simplicity there...if you liked each other, you were a couple, and there you were. Sharing a locker was the equivalent of a marriage license. God, in sixth grade I "dated" a guy that I didn't actually go on dates with. If you're young enough, the label itself is sufficient. (I broke up with him during computer class by telling his friend to tell him that I was moving on. No reason to be tied down at 11, right?)

Driving through my hometown recently, I was realizing how many parking lots my first boyfriend and I had been kicked out of by the town police (who were so bored they would pull up next to you if you idled in front of your friend's house for too long). I know, it sounds so tacky, but we were kids! We all have gearshift scars. The crappy couch in your semi-finished basement only worked for awhile, until parents or younger siblings came bulldozing down for some made-up reason, and then you had to act like you were really watching The State.

I have a friend (you know who you are) who apparently thinks he was born the ladies man that he is now, and claims to not recall any of these awkward teenage hijinks. But you guys do, right? Right?

burn baby, burn

I need to switch sunscreens. My old faithful pink baby bottle SPF 45 has served me well. Trouble is that it's quite literally meant for babies and not adults, and as I mentioned before, it becomes Elmer's Glue once applied. It's okay when I swim but it's a bad lounging sunscreen, and the sand ends up sticking to me like...well, there's nothing to even compare it to, there's NO HUMAN THING that gets sand stuck to them in such an extreme way that they can hardly get it off without exfoliating. Yuck.

The only problem is that my old faithful pink baby bottle SPF 45 works, even in the Carribean, which is really saying something. And I can't deal with a sunscreen that doesn't work. I'm basically allergic to the sun and when I get sunburned I get the flu, or else if I don't apply four or five even layers (no, really) I get my signature selective sunburn, such as the one I have right now in a couple spots on the backs of my legs only, thanks to hours spent learning to golf at Dirty Dancing. I once had a dermatologist tell me that my complexion was meant for "overcast London skies." Very poetic, but not helping me out much around these parts.

My friends don't have this problem. If they're not golden brown then they're at least a subtle bronze, and in that perfectly lovely summery way, not in that scary Malibu Barbie orangey way. They can use spray tanners that don't glop on like mayo, the kind that make a weak claim to contain SPF 8. But because they're my friends, they don't make Casper jokes; one of the Jens once became infuriated with a Clinique saleswoman who tried to sell me a self-tanner that I didn't ask for. No, my friends will diligently slather massive amounts of my sunscreen of choice on my back and neck to protect me from absorbing even a minimal amount of vitamin D. And they put it on evenly, because none of them want to be responsible for a selective sunburn situation.

Anyway, yeah, the switch has to happen. Unfortunately, I'm also a product queen, so when I see that there's a company that makes a sunscreen promising to be "extra soft," I immediately want it. But it's not waterproof. Be rational, Red, don't get sucked in by cute labels. So I pick up a different sunscreen, another SPF 45, and I ask the pharmacy tech if it's any good. She looks at me blankly like I'm asking her to give a dissertation ranking each of the Blistex flavors. I've been going to that pharmacy for three years now and it's not like I ever ask her opinion of anything, so am I really, truly putting her out that much?

She says, "Well, I'd have to ask the pharmacist." I nod and smile; my "would you mind?" loosely translates to "yeah, go do that." She starts to walk over to him and then turns back to me. "So, you want to know how well it works as far as...?"

I don't even know how to answer this. As far as how cute the bottle will look in my bag? "How well it will keep me from getting burned?"

"Okay." She's back in three seconds. "He says it's good."

"Oh. Okay." Is there even a pharmacist back there? Did she just ask the opinion of a row of Percocet bottles? "Good" isn't enough for me to make the switch. I have a relationship with the pink baby bottle! How do I tell her this? She doesn't care. She probably steals Oxycontin.

I bought it anyway. It's less goopy than the baby stuff, but I haven't yet had the opportunity to find out if it really works. But here's hoping it's..."good."

library books smell funny, anyway

I went to the city clerk's office in the Town I Was Born In to get my birth certificate which I need to rectify with the expired passport situation. T minus 16 days till my trip, but it should be okay, unless that's the week they started profiling sunburned redheads. Anyway, I went in and asked if they need to see anything besides my license. Turns out they don't even need that; they just need you to tell them your name, or any name, really, and give them $10. Why is it that easy to get your birth certificate, and yet the library practically does a vital organ scan before they'll approve you to walk around with a library card? I'm just saying.

marshMellow

On Saturday the humidity finally broke...whee! Jen and I went to York Beach and she ended up calling her aunt who had just moved in with her boyfriend in Kennebunkport. I was happy to go visit them but not so happy that our change of plans left us with no time to visit the Fun-O-Rama next to the beach. I took a picture of it instead, and also of a car with an "I Heart Laura Ingalls Wilder" bumper sticker. Maine is a funny place.

Jen's aunt basically dropped whatever she was doing that day to hang out with us, as did her boyfriend, which was nice of him considering he didn't really know Jen and he certainly didn't know me. And because you never get a second chance to make a first impression, I made sure that I was covered in sand when I met them. At some point my sunblock had morphed into superglue, so I was pretty dirty when I got there, despite my best attempts at removal. So they let me take a shower and then I had to pick all the little pieces of sand out of their tub. Pretty ghetto, right? You have to be a special kind of dirty to actually make the bathtub dirty too. Anyway, once I was presentable, they took us out on Saco Bay on Boyfriend's boat. Aunt took pictures of Jen and I in front of a lighthouse on an island, but we were slightly precariously balanced on the edge of the boat so the pictures went like this: blurry, cute of us but off-center lighthouse, us looking a little scared as the boat pitches and we try to maintain picture pose, me forgetting to take my sunglasses off, and finally a perfect shot. I swear, I have the cutest couple shots with my girlfriends. There's one of Connecticut and I from years ago that we refer to as our engagement picture. We almost registered at Bloomingdales.

Anyway, we stayed for dinner and had yummy pepper burgers and corn on the cob. I made the fruit salad but was having so much fun with the cherry pitter that I pitted the whole bag so it was basically a cherry salad. I only missed two pits and Jen got them both. On the way home I entertained her with my own version of "would you rather" until she yelled at me for being too gross. I'm sorry, but that game NEEDS to be way dirty in order to be entertaining. Not for the faint of heart, though, I admit.

As an aside, I really miss my other Jen. She's still in Israel doing good things and helping kids and whatnot. But I want her to come back here and hang out with me at the soup factory and talk about other people. Priorities, come on.

On Sunday, Steve came over and we went to Melissa and Joe's barbecue and had a great time, as usual. I always have a good time with them, whatever we're doing. How great is it to have friends like that? And they're coming to the Cape in a couple weeks so I'm excited for that. So is my mom! She met Joe once and already decided that he needs TLC because he works too much.

Oh, and Melissa happened to mention something in passing about passports and it suddenly occured to me that I might need one that's NOT expired, unless I decide to become an illegal Mexican citizen two and a half weeks from now. I've literally known my passport expiration date for TEN YEARS and now I have to put a rush on it to make sure I have it in time for my trip. It's nice to be in control of your life, let me tell you.

I had to go over to my clinical supervisor's house today so she could sign off on my paperwork for all my certification blahblahness. She's getting married in a couple weeks and was telling me how she had her bachelorette party over the weeekend and they all went out for lunch and then painted pottery. I think I would've thrown a clay bowl against the wall and asked where the freakin' party was. But maybe that's just me.

Bush Nominates Roberts, Son Inexplicably Rocks Out

iConfusion

I like my iPod's genre menu. Is it for times when you're going to have a dinner party and you want to set a certain mood? Genre would be a good word for Zach Braff to throw around at that party. Anyway, I especially like how it gets confused about its classification system. It doesn't want me to mix up the genres of Alternative, Alternative & Punk, Alternative Rock, and AlternRock. Eddie Money's "Take Me Home Tonight" is categorized under Blues (actually, that may be fitting). And Kermit the Frog, too, because he's singing "It's Not Easy Being Green." Too bad the extent of my knowledge of blues begins and ends with, "I got the baby-baby-babysitting blues..." White Snake is under the genre "Genre," proving once and for all that White Snake is stupid ass music, although they can still rock you like a hurricane. "Physical" by Olivia Newton-John is the only song categorized under New Romance. Huh. Belinda Carlisle, Coldplay, K.D. Lang, Tiffany, and my college acapella group are Unclassifiable. I'm imagining them all at the random acquaintances table at a wedding. But best of all, BEST OF ALL, the couple John Mayer songs that I let on against my better judgment are filed under Noise. God, how I love this brilliant little piece of machinery.

home

Dirty Dancing was great. Maybe I'll write more about it later, but it was as good a time as ever, and it was (predictably) hard to come home. I had a chance to start poking around with writing something again, so we'll see what happens with that. It's been awhile.

After all was said and done, the Bride's wedding was a blast. Granted, that was because I knew a lot of people there, and my peoples always bring the fun. We danced for hours and hydrated with wine and beer after the waiters took away our water glasses. Good thinking, guys. It was hotter than hell in the church but it all went by pretty fast. One nice thing was spending some time with Connecticut's boyfriend, who I like more and more every time I see him. It just made me feel really happy for her, and kind of optimistic in general that maybe marriage doesn't have to be a completely scary prospect. Then I'd look at the Bride's husband and try to remind myself that she's happy and to each their own. How freakin' Zen of me.

Anyway, Connecticut and Disney did my hair and Jen did my make-up and they managed to turn me into a girl. It was fun, but I was very happy to be barefoot and bobby-pin free later on that night. Several funny/random/mildly disturbing afterhours happenings later, Jen and I finally fell into bed around four. Her dad had ordered us room service breakfast for the next morning, so it was nice to ingest the hangover greasiness without having to get out of bed. Later on I stopped at my parents' house to pick up some bags I'd left there and to listen to my mom tell me how incredibly stupid and pointless she thought every facet of the wedding was.

If you're watching the Sox/Yankees game right now, why yes that IS my dad behind home plate. I made him not wear his hat because he went by himself and I didn't want him to get any objects hurled at him. Does anyone else think it's kind of funny that the Yankee Haters hats just look like regular Yankees hats?

In other news, this is really funny.

I carried a watermelon?

Packing for Dirty Dancing is kind of ridiculous because even though it's July, you're so far north that it can get pretty cold and you need warm clothes. But then the sun comes out and you need summer things. And you need shoes that can accommodate both types of weather because happy feet are essential. Plus you have to dress up every night... so yeah, I basically end up bringing everything I own, and if given the opportunity I'd probably bring everything you own, too.

The actual Dirty Dancing was on TV last night. Ha. I never really got obsessed with that movie, but it's pretty funny:

-In real life, Johnny would clearly be gay. Dance teacher, tight t-shirts with cap sleeves, and he's tired of being used for sex (his words) by vast numbers of female guests.
-No guy who works at a resort complains about being used for sex by the guests.
-Johnny spends a lot of the movie being really irritated with Baby. In movies, when you act like you don't like somebody, it tends to mean that you secretly worship them and really just fear they'll never grasp the depth of your affection. In real life, if you act like you don't like somebody it's usually just because they're a total fuck bunny.
-I also love that there was this MASSIVE socioeconomic divide and the guests were all rich and preppy and felt so above the wrong-side-of-the-tracks staff, when the place was basically like this no-frills summer camp for adults.
-I like casually working the word "socioeconomic" into sentences.
-Why was everyone impressed with the lift at the end of the dance? It was kind of dumb and it took like ALL of Baby's vacation to learn it. Sorry, I'm such a bad child of the 80s.
-"Wow, a secret room full of professional dancers! I can't believe how vanilla I am! Who should I sleep with in order to rectify that and instantly make me worldly at, what, 16?"
-Baby's hair looked like all of our sixth grade perms. What was wrong with her, and us?
-She's Like the Wind is the funniest song! Plus, doesn't Patrick Swayze sing it? Although honestly, how much did you play that tape on your Walkman when you were in middle school? I know I did.
-WAIT wasn't that Hungry Eyes song in the movie, too?
-I LOVE movies (and songs and everything else) that are so bad, they're fantastic. But you knew that.

let's all go to Saskatchewan in August

Because I couldn't live with myself if I missed this.

eye am scared

I'm not an exceptionally squeamish person. In grad school I did laryngoscopies until I was blue in the face, spent hours watching x-rays of people ingesting barium applesauce and pudding (and refluxing them, if I was lucky), cut open the vocal tract of a dead guy, and did a jillion oral exams, and trust me, some people have very bad oral hygiene. Granted, I wasn't into that part of my job, because um, hi, I'm not in medical school, but I'm just making a point: I'm not overly squeamish.

Except for one thing: I have a total eye issue. You know how sometimes people will touch their eye while they're talking to you, like they'll rub it or try to get something out of it? Yeah, that makes me want to die. I always have to look away because it totally squishes me out. And I can't touch my own eye... I have to put eye drops in by lying down, squeezing the drop onto the corner of my eyelid, and then opening my eye and letting gravity do its work.

There aren't a lot of times in your life when not liking to touch your eyeball is a problem, until you find out you need to get contacts. I'm far-sighted and wear glasses sometimes, and I used to have contacts, but I haven't worn them for years because I hate them so freaking much, and I can see fine without them. Or could, until recently. Lately I've been feeling like I don't see as well without my glasses so I went to the eye doctor, and she confirmed what I was dreading: when I'm not wearing glasses, I need to wear contacts. I don't want to wear my glasses all the time but I also want to be able to see, so this is where we are.

"I can't touch my eyeball," I tell her.

"How did you used to put the contact in and take it out?" she asks me.

"Putting it in was okay because I could just sort of slip it in without direct touching. But when I'd take it out, I'd just flick it so I didn't have to touch my eye."

"You'd flick it?" Now I feel a little ashamed.

Then she tells me she can teach me how to do it the right way. I don't mean to beat a dead horse, but I think it bears repeating: "I really can't touch my eyeball."

"Really, I can teach you. Next week, we'll set up a time and we'll sit down and I'll teach you how to do it. Without flicking."

Doubtful. "Okay."

She's confident. "It WILL be okay!"

Anxiety attack. "All right."

Now she's bordering on cocky. "It'll be a breeze, you'll see."

So, next Thursday, I'm going to touch my eyeball. Both of them. Wish me luck, or come over and get me a little drunk beforehand. It may take longer for me to find my eye, but I bet I won't be as anxious.

in which I refer to Neil Diamond twice

My mom and I were discussing the music that I was obsessed with when I was little. I loved Physical by Olivia Newton-John and any of Whitney Houston's dance songs or power ballads. I used to freak out with happiness when I'd hear What a Feeling (although I thought they were saying "take your pants down and make it happen" instead of "take your passion and make it happen"...interpret that how you will). Heartlight by Neil Diamond and Can't Smile Without You by Barry Manilow used to make me cry (Heartlight still makes me cry. In my defense, it's the ET song). And one more, apparently:

Her: And that Linda Ronstadt song.
Me: What? Linda Ronstadt?
Her: That song that went, "It's not that I knock it, it's just that I'm not in the market for a boy who wants to love only me."
Me: What?
Her: You used to LOVE it.
Me: When I was LITTLE?
Her: You don't remember? [singing] "You cry and moan and say it will work out, but I've got my doubts...All I'm saying is I'm not ready for any person, place, or thing to try and pull the reins in on me."
Me: So that song is basically the root of all my relationship issues.
Her: Wow, yeah. I should have played you more Barry Manilow.

Speaking of bad music, driving home from New York last weekend, Jen and I heard Hello Again by Neil Diamond*, and we were singing along (or, really, speaking along, because all he really does is say "hello" over and over, totally monotone: "I couldn't sleep at all tonight...and I know it's late...but I couldn't wait...hello." I was laughing so hard I was crying. Granted, I was delirious with exhaustion, but still...that song is freaking hilarious.)

*Fine, we heard it because it's on my iPod. Happy now?

lucky duck

Tonight during ESL class I made an offhand comment that one of the students was lucky. Another student, a very sweet older woman, said to me, "Lucky? What is this?"

How do you explain "lucky" to someone who understands and speaks very little English? "Lucky is when something good happens to you," I start out.

"Something good," she says.

"Yes, like...okay." I go over to my purse and take out a dollar bill, throw it on the floor, and then proceed to act out walking around idly and suddenly finding money on the floor. I pick it up; I'm excited. "I'm lucky!" (This is the unglamorous reality of teaching ESL when you only speak English.)

"I like when she acts," says one of my students. He's speaking directly to me. We haven't worked on pronouns yet.

"I know you do," I say. I once pantomimed football for him, reducing the game to sporadically interrupted suicide runs, which it basically is anyway.

Another guy imitates scratching a lottery ticket. "I win money," he says. "I'm lucky!"

Hmmm. Any non-money related examples? Didn't she see Napolean? "Shocks, pegs...lucky!"

"Lucky," she says. "I go to a party, I'm lucky."

"Good," I say, thinking, that depends on the party. (Most of the things you'd think of saying back to her don't really work: sort of, kind of, getting warmer, you're close...luckily working with young kids knocks all that figurative shit right out of you.)

I ended up borrowing her Russian-English dictionary and finding "lucky" for her. But she didn't have her glasses with her so I wrote it on the board. Have you ever written a word in Russian before? It's basically like inside out, upside down English. But she got it, and after she corrected my penmanship she told me they have nine vowels in Russian. And good parties, apparently.

speak up, sonny

Last night around 11 I was tired so my friends dropped my sorry self back at home...and then went right back to the bar and stayed until the wee hours. Tonight I plan to have dinner at 4 PM and fall asleep on the couch while watching Wheel of Fortune and knocking back some Ensure. That's right, folks: I'm now officially a senior citizen.

jegabots?

I wrote this when I was seven. Then Hasbro bought my idea and I made a fortune. Just kidding.

"My Little Ponys"

Once in a far away land there lived a big group of little ponys. The babies were named Applejack, Bow-Tie, Cotten Candy, Sugar and Spice and Taffy. The oldest were Twilight Moondancer, Star Beauty, Firefly Cloverleaf, Burning Beauty and Star Shine Flyer. One day the Jegabots horridble beasts jumped out of the blue sky the instante they did the sky darkened and the beasts let out a roar. The ponys jumped on their highn legs and ran for the doors! There were 3 little babie ponys behind the tree hiding. It was Taffy, Bow-Tie and Cotten Candy. 3 beasts roared after the little babie ponys. Eeeeeeee! they screamed before you could say “it” a beast bit Bow-Ties hair. Help! Help! Help! screamed everyone. The Jegabots flew up into the dark dark sky and were gone, so were the ponys! As soon as they were out of sight the sky lighted and the beautiful sun came out. Firefly spread her wings and flew into the sky. Come back! shouted Burning Beauty. It’s dangeres! cried Applejack. Where are you going? screamed Twilight. To get help! answered Firefly. Oh no! cried Moondancer. Meanwhile at the castle...

it's a small dating world

Do most people and their friends live in a little Days of Our Lives universe, or is that just me and mine? Over the weekend we were discussing our twisted little circle of relationships in our early to mid 20s. It went a little something like this:

I got fixed up with my coworker's best friend and dated him for a long time, and then one of my friends started dating his roommate.

One of my friends dated a guy for awhile, and then introduced him to my roommate at the time and they dated for a couple of years.

One of my friends used to date Mark's best friend.

I introduced a guy that I didn't like to a friend and she ended up deciding to marry him.

I lived with a guy for two years who originally agreed to be my roommate because he was dating one of my friends at the time. (They had broken up by the time we moved in.)

I fixed a friend up with a guy I knew from college who then proceeded to stalk her. (He also had a semi-high profile job and would ask me in a really self-important way to please not to give his email address out. Like anyone ever asked.)

I dated a guy who used to date a girl that I graduated from high school with. He was actually at my (well, her) graduation, and, funny enough, he's in the background of a picture that my mom took of my boyfriend at the time, but I wouldn't meet him until six years later.

One time I got fixed up with a guy and didn't like him, and then one of my friends went out with him and didn't like him either. He's a friend of the guy that my friend decided to marry. (All of us are in the wedding party. No awkwardness there.)

I work with a girl who keeps pestering me to fix her up with a guy that dated a friend of mine in high school. (He's worked with my dad since he got out of college, and he used to write my friend love notes with Righteous Brothers song lyrics. In his defense, he was like 16 at the time.)

I'm friends with a guy whose best friend's sister Mark used to sleep with in college.

I just spent the wedding of the guy who I lived with for two years who used to date my friend sitting next to a guy whose wife used to sleep with a guy that I was forced to friend-dump because he was really, really annoying.

I'm sure there's a bunch I'm forgetting about, too. I guess it's a good thing we all decided to get our own social lives. For the most part.